Category: Healing From Chronic Pain And Illness

It’s amazing how my brain tells me I can’t do something quite often. And it’s even more amazing that when I can get out of my brain and into my heart and soul, I’m able to do just the things it says I can’t.

Last night, as I was attempting to get myself to sleep, my brain continued to tell me that there was no way I was going to be able to make a 12 to 13 hour drive I would be attempting to make the next morning to visit my partner (we currently live apart). Normally I would fly but with financial issues looming, I opted to drive for the first time. Even more interesting is that he doesn’t even know I’m visiting, it’s a surprise for our anniversary which is February 25th.

So as I lay there reciting mantra after mantra, doing breath work and trying to get myself to fall asleep five hours sooner than my normal bed time, I drifted in and out of an anxiety based state. If you’ve read any of my previous postings you’ll know by now that I handle day to day chronic pain currently in my life. Sitting or standing for extended periods is quite a challenge.  The anxiety finally got the best of me this morning bringing me fully awake at 4:00am. After my morning prayer, mantras, and chakra balance, I was on the road with the clock reading 5:20am. The clock hadn’t passed a complete hour before I had already thought many times about turning around. But, there was a thought that was more silent and more subtle. It was one telling me that this was a lesson in my life to learn.

I’ve been going through chronic pain now since April 20th, 2010 and have been healing slowly. I have chosen to heal holistically which is a much longer process than taking prescription drugs and having invasive medical procedures done. For the last few years I have battled the same feelings about this healing like I was about the drive this morning. I have wanted to give up, to pop some pills, to go back to my old addictions, or have surgery done to see if maybe it might help somehow with any of what I feel every day. It’s almost been three years now since that day it all began to manifest on a physical level.  The progress I have made to change my way of living and become healthier on every level has been arduous but fulfilling. And I’m still moving forward, one day at a time. Really, one moment at a time. And I haven’t chosen to go back to any of my old behaviors or go get that surgery doctors aren’t even confident will help.

So back to my drive and how this all relates. Within that first hour of my drive as some of my pain kicked in and the doubt crept in, I made a decision. I made a commitment. I’m not going to go back. Not in this. Not in my healing. Not in anything that is going to bring me closer to becoming a spiritual warrior for God. I’m tired of giving up. My father and mother gave up and cut their lives short by their own actions. Their parents gave up as well suffering tragic endings too. I’ve seen a lot of tragedy in my family with a lot of throwing in the towel. I made a decision in my life that I wouldn’t follow in their footsteps. My decision today to go through with this drive, and my decision to keep healing holistically, is all part of a bigger plan. One where God can one day use me as an inspiration for others who are going through trials and tribulations. Giving up on my drive, giving up on my healing, and giving up on my life, would prevent that dream from happening.

Incidentally, I’m writing this now in a Starbucks at my destination. Along the way, I made several stops to get out and stretch when I started to feel overwhelmed. I followed within the speed limit and actually arrived three hours sooner than I was supposed to.

I feel pretty amazing right now. Regardless of the pain, I’ve had a smile on my face and thanked God for giving me the strength to get here. My partner has no idea yet that I’m here. He’s in school right now and because I arrived early, I have time to kill that I didn’t expect I would have. It’s funny how these things happen. It’s funny how when I shut the old tapes off and made a decision from my spirit, what I can accomplish.

While the drive may seem like a small thing, it’s really not. It represents a small victory in the bigger picture of my life. One that I am going to win with God at the center of it. I am healing holistically. It has taken awhile, and I know there is never an end to the generic healing process one goes through in life to getting closer to Source. But what I do know is that there will be an end to these short term chronic pain issues that I’ve been dealing with as long as I keep going, putting one foot in front of the other, and telling myself just like the little red engine did, that I can do it too.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

Faith is a strange thing. It’s easy to say that I’m faithful when everything is going great in my life. When I’m on the top of the world earning great money, where my health is awesome, where I have a great relationship, and where my social calendar seems quite full, sure it would be easy for me to say that life is grand and that I have faith in God’s plan for me.

How about the reverse? Where is my faith when I’m unable to work and am earning no money?Where is my faith when my health is filled daily with chronic pain? Where is my faith when most of my friendships have disappeared and where my weekend nights are spent alone? I’ve been pondering these questions a lot lately as I continue to deal with a shift that I’ve been praying is an energetic one to raise my spiritual vibration.

First, what is the definition of faith in God (or a Higher Power). It is when one makes the Words of God (or Higher Power) the main determining factor for every action you take, and remaining at peace whether you know the outcome or not.

Not too long ago I remember feeling like I was living on top of the world. I was earning $82,000 a year, had a partnership with a person I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with, had all the latest and greatest gadgets, owned a nice single family home, had two cars, and a nice retirement building up. Back then the excitement of my life consisted of living in the indulges of what this world had to offer. Traveling often, dining out frequently, engaging in multiple sports leagues, shopping for whatever I wanted and thought I needed, and often being driven sexually either with my partner or on the web with images and chatrooms.

I went to church at that time in my life. I did weekly bible studies too. I even was serving communion and had become a Deacon. And I told everyone how faithful I was in God and that God was rewarding me daily with plenty of abundance. Using the definition of faith in God that I just wrote in here, I knew the outcome of where I was at every day. There were relatively little surprises in my life at that time. And other than some minor incidences that I call hiccups in my life, my life went pretty smoothly and I made sure to always present to others that I had faith.

Faith is truly the absence of proof of anything tangible. Faith is something that one does not go around and tell everyone it is within themselves. Faith is walking through ANY situation and being ok with it no matter if the results are favorable or not.

Somewhere along the lines, things fell apart in my life and things became very unfavorable. I turned to addictions to sustain my life force and vitality. I chose quick highs to keep myself going. As the years passed, I lost that partner. I lost my home. I lost my business. I lost most of the money I had saved up. I lost many friends who I thought were close to me. And then over the course of the past three years, I lost my health and my ability to work. Since then, I have been in chronic pain with serious Fibromyaliga, prostatitis, and severe sciatica and numbness on my left leg and foot. Add in depression and anxiety and that is my current state of health.

So where is my faith now? Where is my faith in God? I wish I had the perfect story to share. I wish I could say that I felt everyday that everything is going to be ok and that God is going to get me through this and that all this was a healing process. I can’t say that. Where I once walked around with my head up high telling everyone how much faith I had. I find myself questioning God a lot. I find myself asking if God exists a lot. I find myself asking if there really is a plan for me. My faith has been shaken. On most days when the pain is high like today or like yesterday, I find myself asking those closest to me if I’m ever going to make it through this. Where I’m at now I find myself reflecting on the story of Job a lot.

I love the story of Job. Job is a wonderful story in the Bible that although I’m not religious, I love to read and reflect on it. Job had everything and then he lost everything. Job was faithful to God when he had everything and even when he had nothing. And even though Job didn’t understand why he lost everything for a period of time, he continuously prayed and asked God for understanding. The worst Job ever got was cursing the day his own birth happened and demanding God take his life. And Job eventually did have God speak to him and after God spoke about faith, Job was rewarded with everything he lost and then some. Job had lost his wife, his land, his ability to work, his children, and his health. And Job gained it all back at the end. How much time in between did the losses last for? It never says. I wish it did.

It’s been 9 months now where I’ve been living free from all things that I would say are poison to a spiritual life. I have a very diligent list of spiritual things I do each day to keep me on that path. And while I everyday thank God for making it through one more day of what I endure, I do find myself often asking why I’m here and going through all this now. I find myself asking if God has a plan for me through all of this. I pray a lot throughout the day. Much of it is me just asking for strength and help to make it through one more day, one more hour, one more minute, or even one more second of the pain I endure.

I’m not taking drugs or medicines to deal with what I’m dealing with. I was reacting violently to every medication when I tried that route and also feeling extremely numb and indifferent to life. I was either a zombie then or a sponge for pain now. Truthfully I’d rather be a sponge for the pain right now as I at least am able to feel tears, my sadness, and my emotions in general.

On any of the drugs I used to take, or any of the medications, or even with any of the people I put in my life to chase after, all of it just numbed me from the pain that was there. It wasn’t healing any of it.

I’m not sure what I believe right now in this moment on what’s happening to me. I wanted to write an article that showed my truth. The real me. I had written a lot of hopeful stories so far about my life that all are indeed very true. But there is also much in my life that is challenging that I would not wish upon anyone and I felt today it was necessary to share those truths with the level of pain I’m feeling today.

I know one thing. My faith is being tested. I pray to God everyday to make it through this and to heal holistically. I pray to become a complete servant for God’s needs. I pray that I don’t ever go back to the toxic living that I once did not too long ago. I pray that my DNA makeup in my body will shift to drive me down spiritual paths rather than the toxic ones. And I give God thanks at the end of each day in a journal writing down at least nine things that happened that day that I was appreciative of.

Does God exist?

If so, is He watching me?

Is all of what I’m going through a test of my faith?

Is all of what I feel just a shift to make me spiritually healthier?

I don’t know the answers to those questions. I do know one thing. I’ll keep on doing what I’m doing, which is praying to the God that I believe is there, to the God that has gotten me this far, and to the God that has sustained me through so much already. And I’ll hope that one day I’ll see this from a better perspective, one where I can look back and understand why it is that I went through it all in the first place.

Regardless, I will keep on sending out my love to God and trusting in an old AA saying, “This Too Shall Pass…” And in doing that, I know I am being faithful…

Peace, Love, Light, and Joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

The last few years of my life have been challenging as I’ve been facing physical health issues that surfaced. How I’ve handled them is ironic as it’s paying attention now to the messages I was getting when it all started.

Physical health issues more often than not are the result of imbalances within ourselves that began a long time before the first physical symptom manifested itself. April 27th, 2010 was the day the severe sciatica and numbness began in my left leg. This progressed into developing prostatitis and then other aches and pains that fell under the label of Fibromyaliga. For the first two years after the initial onset of these physical health symptoms, I looked for physical causes and physical treatments. What I didn’t realize is that this all began on a spiritual level a young age.

I, like everyone else, is a spiritual being in a human vessel. I believe we all come here to learn various lessons but in each of them, we are meant to love and embrace each other unconditionally. Sadly, along the way, life happens. Hardship happens. Bad things happen. And our focus shifts to preservation of self we we find ways to be happy that are very selfishly centered.

I was born into an alcoholic family and I was neglected and unloved by them and molested by an outsider in the first 16 years of my life. Spiritually, I had no conception of unconditional love, hope, joy, and peace. Shortly after turning 17, I found my solution to be alcohol and drugs. From then until the age of 23 when they no longer quieted my spiritual imbalances from my childhood, I found my mental thoughts becoming more and more negative. My outlook on life was looking more clouded. I was seeing things through a set of jaded eyes.

Between 23 and 35 years old, I sought out other addictions as my solution rather than finding spiritual peace within and healing from all that unrest as a child. As I mentioned in an earlier posting, I chased sex and love, gambling, caffeine, geographical cures, shopping, traveling, and more until eventually between 35 and 38 years old my emotional state went to a constant up and down with anxiety and depression.

I still didn’t listen to the messages my own body was giving me. I kept myself in unhealthy and abusive friendships and relationships, I chased after people who didn’t want to be with me, I indulged in things that were poisonous to my body, until I found myself in a relationship with a married man (to a woman) who was closeted, a homophobic, and an alcoholic. On some level, I had come back around full circle to my life as a child where I was a son to two very sick alcoholic parents. And then after many days of enduring incredible sadness with this relationship, and many days of carrying constant worry and fear about it, the physical pain started in my left leg. April 27th, 2010.

The messages to heal were there a long time ago. I got sick first spiritually when I grew up in a family that was unhealthy. I didn’t choose to work on releasing that sickness through therapy or some other healing modality when I left home, I chose things to numb those feelings. As time went on, I chased thing after thing and person after person, growing first mentally sick with constant negativity and doubt about my future and then emotionally sick with anxiety and depression. My intuitive self along the way continued to tell me that this person wasn’t good for me, this decision wasn’t the right one for me, this job wasn’t a good fit for me, and this relationship wasn’t healthy for me, but I wasn’t listening.

Those messages got louder, the pain got stronger, until it had to manifest itself somewhere and the only place it had left to go to release itself out of me was on the physical level. So here I am today, January 24th, 2013, still dealing with physical pain. There is a difference though. I realized I can heal and will heal but I have to start from the beginning.

About 9 months ago, I parted ways with all things toxic in my life including possessions, people, meetings and anything else that was perpetuating these life patterns of pain. I then had a baseline to start with and I reached out to God and said to please heal me from within. There are many drugs out there both legal and illegal that have been produced to bring about less pain. All of them on some level simply suppress the body’s own ability to heal. I went down that path for the first few years of this pain and got nowhere other than more angry in life and seeking out worldly things to cope with a miserable existence.

In the past 9 months, I have worked on my spiritual presence here. I pray throughout the day to live in my higher self and to serve a higher existence. I seek God to run my thoughts, words, and actions. I meditate at least 30 minutes in silence once a day. I spend between 30 and 45 minutes every day stating positive mantras. I listen to a spiritual message each morning for 20 minutes to start off my day. And I end my day with writing 9 different things to be grateful for to God in that given day. With all that work, my life has gotten better. First mentally. I noticed my thinking became more positive. My words became more positive. Life seemed a little less negative and clouded. And the more days that I continued to do all these actions, I noticed the depression and anxiety lessened as well. I added in bi-weekly acupuncture, polarity and reiki, and weekly therapy sessions and eliminated all chemical medications and caffeine in the process.

I have started to get some slight relief in my physical pain on many days. I believe that the more I continue my path of healing in the order I got sick, I will get better. I realized I decline first spiritually, then mentally, then emotionally, and finally physically. My healing has been in that same order. I had to work on the spiritual unrest from my childhood first and all the things. I followed on with that throughout my life. Then, I worked on my mental thought process through the mantras and therapy. Thought that and other positive actions, I found emotional healing taking place.

It’s just a matter of time with God at the center now for my life and my healing that the physical relief will come. In the meantime, all I have is today, one day at a time, and I will live it with having God at the helm guiding me on how to be the most loving, spiritual being that I can be in this lifetime.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson